


Love and Other Areas of Scientific Interest

by Tibby



Category: Treasure Planet (2002)
Genre: Adventure & Romance, Alien Flora & Fauna, F/M, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-17
Updated: 2020-12-17
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:35:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28131783
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tibby/pseuds/Tibby
Summary: Delbert persuades Amelia to accompany him on an expedition in search of a mysterious creature called the sponderix.
Relationships: Amelia/Delbert Doppler
Comments: 8
Kudos: 14
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	Love and Other Areas of Scientific Interest

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Settiai](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Settiai/gifts).



“MED-DIC. Um… MAKE. BETTER. No, look, hold on a second.”

Amelia shifted the weight on her back and attempted a one handed mime of a doctor caring for an ailing patient. Her conversational partner made no answer, or any indication that he knew what she was trying to convey, but he did look as though he was trying not to laugh. Amelia herself did not find anything amusing in the situation.

“How could you not understand?” she cried out in frustration, “A perfect mime! I could not have made it any clearer!”

Delbert, slumped across her back, stirred slightly. He shifted his head to stare out of bleary eyes at the silent, bemused person opposite them. He had no recollection of where they were or why Amelia was carrying him. He was realising, though, with growing clarity, that he felt absolutely terrible.

The silent person peered at him, interested and concerned. He uttered his first words. Delbert recognised them at once – Bilurian dialect. He should have guessed by the crescent-moon-shaped tattoo next to the left eye, traditional among the Bilurian administrative class. Then again, his eyes had only just managed to focus enough to make out details. He made a weak reply.

“What’s that?” Amelia cried, startled, “You know what he’s saying?”

“He says I look in bad shape and you should probably take me to see a doctor.”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to do!”

Delbert and the Bilurian continued to talk for a few moments until Delbert passed out again. The Bilurian turned his attention back to Amelia. He jerked his head to the north-west, shaking his ponytail of fur-covered tentacles. Then he began to walk away. A few steps later, he turned around to see Amelia standing still, processing what had just occurred. He jerked his head again, and this time he pointed a thumb to reiterate his point. Amelia gathered her thoughts at once, made sure Delbert was secure on her back, and then stepped briskly after him.

Amelia was relieved that the workers at the medical centre carried universal translators as part of their standard equipment. They were few in number and most of them were Bilurian. It made sense – the planet of Balphour had been Bilurian territory for centuries before Arturia had seized it a few decades ago. It had never been colonised, however, and Arturia had abandoned it in order to focus on more profitable worlds. It carried on how it had always carried on, with a living population of just a few hundred thousand, all on one continent of the southern hemisphere. It was a place for religious hermits and those desperate big game hunters who could make just enough money from meat and furs to get themselves off planet again.

_Oh,_ Amelia suddenly thought to herself, _and let’s not forget the great scientific interest._

She fixed a wry smile on Delbert, sleeping in the bed next to her seat. The simple action seemed to take all the tension out of her body. After two solar days of worry, she could smile again. She could make jokes at Delbert’s expense. Delbert’s fever had broken, the colour had come back to his complexion, and his breathing was normal. The doctor had reassured her that the worst was over. And, oh, what an angel he looked as he slept. Amelia swore she would never sleep again, just to stay awake and look at that sweet angel face. What a wonderful, infuriating man he was.

As she made these joyous, foolish promises, the doctor placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. Amelia quickly centred herself, rising fluidly and elegantly from the low stool she sat on.

“Thank you, doctor,” she said, “You’ve done a first rate job. I can’t express how grateful I am.”

The doctor smiled. “He’ll need a few days’ rest,” she told her, “But he’ll be as healthy as he ever was. We’ve treated plenty of people with the fever. It’s timing that’s key. He’s lucky you were able to get him here when you did.”

Delbert was half-asleep. He was conscious of distant, chattering voices – two of them, happy voices. He was conscious of feeling very heavy. He was comfortable and warm though, sandwiched between two soft things. Where was he? Not in his own bed, he knew that much. Some other bed. In bed, precise bed unknown. Where had he been? He thought back. What was the last thing he could remember? Running. He had definitely been running.

He felt the pounding of his feet on the ground. Each step rattled his bones but he was too terrified to mind. His lungs and throat burned but he hardly noticed them either. He didn’t even think about running, he just did it, and he ran faster than he’d ever run. Amelia had been trying to get him to exercise like this for years. All she’d needed to do, it turned out, was to turn a huge, ravenous carnivore on him. Fear was quite the motivator.

Amelia was running too. He could see her just ahead, running in long leaping strides like the ground was made of springs and she was lighter than air. She kept making quick glances back at him. Through the fog of sheer, abject terror, a voice in his mind suddenly screamed out: _“How did we end up here?”_

Delbert tried to cast his mind back further.

They were trekking through the wilds of Balphour. He had dreamed of seeing these jungles for years. When they had started out from the docked ship that morning, he’d had all the energy that only intense, passionate interest could provide. The heat, the damp, the multitudinous population of tiny bitey things – nothing could touch that spark.

Now, however, they were several hours into the trek and he was starting to suspect that they might be lost.

Amelia passed the map tablet to him, sensing that he was about to take it. They hadn’t spoken to each other for the past two miles. Her lips were pressed tightly together and her hand sprang sharply away as soon as Delbert took hold of the map.

“It’s not even on here!” Delbert said, pointing to the prominent, jagged rock they had passed for the third time. There was no mistaking it. It had a protruding crystal formation that was very distinct.

“I am aware,” Amelia answered, quietly, dangerously.

“Where did you get these charts exactly?”

“There’s nothing wrong with the blasted charts. I’ve used that mapmaker for years, I’d trust him to map out the back of my own hand.”

“Well, something’s wrong!”

“What?”

“I think you know what.”

“If you make one remark about my navigation skills, by the stars I will make myself a widow!”

Amelia stared Delbert straight in the eye. Delbert held her gaze until he let out a yelp of frustration and span on his heel, kicking out at the uncharted rock that had made his life miserable.

The rock trembled under his foot.

Slowly, the mass of stone began to rise. The ragged line of four jutting peaks around the central mound stretched outwards, resolving themselves into four distinct legs. In that central mound, Delbert suddenly realised that the strange crystalline protrusion he’d previously noted was not an abstract geological formation but a snout. On it, our nostrils flared and steamed. Then the snout rose as a stone mouth roared open, revealing line upon line of sharp, glinting teeth.

All the sounds of the jungle seemed to die away and Delbert could only hear his wife’s voice, quiet and slow, saying, _“What is that?”_

He didn’t answer.

That was when they had started running.

They had been furious at each other in that moment when Delbert kicked the rock to vent his frustration. Delbert believed he, at least, had every right to be. Amelia was so sure of herself, always singing her own praises when it came to spacemanship. She wouldn’t even think of letting him carry the map but _she_ was the one who had gotten them lost. It didn’t matter to her that he had a doctorate, oh no, he was just a liability.

So perhaps he had been the one who had enraged the carnivorous rock beast by kicking it in the leg. That was an honest accident, not a failure in skills. And he hadn’t been so smug about it.

She barely even seemed to understand the importance of Balphour. Just because it was all but ignored by merchant ships. It was important _because_ it was ignored. It was that rare planet that still held secrets to be discovered. Even its known flora and fauna were desperate for further study. In particular, Delbert had, for years, harboured a fascination with a little-documented creature called the sponderix, a tiny, spined insectivorous mammal. When he’d brought up the sponderix to Amelia, she’d had nothing to say (and Amelia always had something to say). The sponderix had been on Delbert’s mind ever since he and Amelia had been discussing her work diary. Her latest commission would take her close to Balphour and she had no further work lined up after it was done with, she’d have time to spare.

“So I can spend my well-earned free time chasing some prickly rat across a back-water planet? What a delightful idea, I’m so glad you suggested it.”  
Delbert had explained how he’d always harboured a secret ambition of making the first detailed study of the sponderix. This gained him nothing but a roll of the eyes. Amelia simply had no appreciation for the things that mattered.

Thinking back, though, he did remember looking at her as he tried to explain the sponderix’s scientific importance, and catching a glimpse of a smile. A very sweet, very tender smile, in fact.

They were running. They were running and there was a huge, roaring creature right on their tail. They were running and Delbert had no idea what they would do when they couldn’t run anymore. The stone beast certainly didn’t seem to be losing energy. 

Amelia was still ahead. She glanced back again. She seemed to be making a turn. She pointed frantically to the left. Delbert had no idea what was happening but he made to turn left as well. She intercepted him and grabbed hold of his hand. They were running up a low slope. Then, abruptly, there was nothing beneath their feet and they were falling. Delbert only registered the bed of swampy mud below shortly before his face hit the surface. His entire body sank under the mud.

For a moment, something seemed to be holding him down, then he broke the surface. He snorted a wet lungful of putrid, swampy air.

“What?” he demanded, wiping the mud from his eyes in order to get a look at Amelia.

Amelia shot a finger to her lips and pointed upwards. Delbert turned to see the overhang they had just leapt from. At the edge, the stone beast was turning his head blindly from side to side, thrusting his snout in the air. After a minute or so, he seemed to give up hope, turned, and rumbled away.

“What?” Delbert hissed again, once the beast was beyond earshot.

Amelia laughed, her irrepressible, hearty laugh.

“You do look a picture, doctor!”

They both looked as terrible as each other, and they carried the stench to match.

“I reiterate,” snapped Delbert, furious, “ _What just happened?_ ”

Amelia held up the mud-sodden map-tablet.

“A reliable piece of equipment after all,” she smirked, “I’d been avoiding these sulphurous swamps. They’re all over the place. But didn’t you notice? That blasted creature’s eyes? He didn’t have any, but he had that great, lumpen snout. I guessed he was sniffing us out, so I thought I’d better get us to a place where he wouldn’t be able to. Looks like I was right.”

“That’s… that’s quite ingenious,” said Delbert, a little reluctantly.

“Maybe some of your scientific method is rubbing off on me,” Amelia smiled.

They swam together to the bank of the swamp. Safely on dry land again, they washed off the worst of the mud with a little water from Delbert’s pack and some clean, broad leaves.

Delbert was focusing on wiping down his sleeve. He was trying not to feel like a complete idiot, but he was increasingly afraid that that was exactly what he was. After all, he had been so mad with Amelia for not taking him seriously. But hadn’t she come with him on this adventure after all? And then saved both their lives? He had a feeling that he would just have to swallow his pride and apologise.

He got as far as saying, “Amelia,” before an overwhelming lightheaded feeling washed over him.

That was when he had passed out.

Delbert’s eyelids fluttered open. At first, he could see nothing but a blur of pale colours but gradually his vision began to focus. There was Amelia, right there beside him, waiting.

“Amelia…”

Amelia smiled at him warmly. Maybe his eyes weren’t right yet, but it looked as though she might have been crying.

“I’m sorry,” Delbert said.

Amelia continued to look at him, as though she hadn’t heard him say anything. Then, all at once, his words seemed to reach her ears and she laughed, “What for?”

“For being a pain in the backside. You didn’t have to go on this trip with me, but you did. And all I’ve done is complain.”

Amelia shook her head. “Pish posh. I mean, I haven’t been such a peach myself.”

“We probably would have been eaten by that beast if it wasn’t for you.”

Amelia considered this. She didn’t feel like taking any credit. The long hours of worrying over Delbert had exhausted her and she didn’t have her usual store of glib good humour. “Well,” she conceded, forcing a lightness in her voice, “I’ve lost count of the times we’ve had to save each other’s’ lives. You take a turn, I take a turn.”

“Still...”

They were silent for a moment.

“Look,” said Amelia, turning to the bedside table, “Here’s something for you. The doctor thought you might be interested in seeing what caused your fever.”

In her gloved claws, Amelia held up a short red needle, gleaming in the light of the hospital’s dim lanterns.

Delbert’s jaw dropped. He stammered a few incomprehensible words.

“Yes, the doctor says they get a fair few people who have been stung by one of these. They’re near enough experts on the symptoms.”

“A sponderix spine!” Delbert cried out at last.

Amelia passed it over and Delbert took the tiny specimen, carefully, reverentially, in his fingers. When he was finally able to tear his eyes away from it, his gaze, falling on Amelia, was damp and gleaming.

“This might be the finest day of my life,” he uttered. Then, quickly recollecting himself, he amended, “Aside from our wedding day, of course.”

Amelia didn’t seem to hold the slip up against him.

“Thank you,” he went on, “For being here with me.”

Amelia didn’t hesitate a moment before replying: “I wouldn’t have missed it for any world in the Aetherium.”


End file.
